Charging beasts

[North of the human empire]

Appearing in a relatively calm spot a few hundred meters away from the nearest fight, Darganth's form shifted to a humanoid appearance that easily disappeared in the small group of ten or so trees amid which he stood. From there, he swept his gaze across the battlefield, with his attention briefly pausing on a group of beasts whose charge was just about to impact a formation about twice their number.

Briefly surprised by the presence of both a high number of fourth and even third ranks as well as the roughly a quarter of the enemy formation that was made up of beastmen, he quickly concluded that the battle had changed more than expected in the ten or so minutes he had been busy with his fight.

At the same time as he finished this thought, the two forces he was watching also collided. First, about half of the over a hundred fourth-rank beasts slammed into their opponent's formation. With their forms all shrunk down to stand about five meters tall, they still trampled over the first row of enemies even as the occasional aura avatar rose to match them.

Though not killing many with this and suffering some casualties in return, the beasts nonetheless broke into the formation. But just as they started to pounce at the far more scattered groups behind this, a volley of spells erupted from the humans standing near the rear of the formation.

Slamming into the beasts at close range, they let the formation erupt with explosions of all elements. Though ineffective in killing many of the beasts, this brought their momentum to an abrupt halt, allowing the aura users and melee weapon wielding mages to rally.

Led by two of the three mythic ranks among them, these two groups charged at the beasts. Matching the mass and power of their towering forms with aura avatars, the smaller humans and beastmen darted around the beast's strikes. And while each of the latter's attacks that connected with anything but an aura avatar took its target out of the fight, wounds quickly started to accumulate on the beasts.

Amid this, the two mythic ranks were the sole individuals not fighting in groups. Instead, they met and overpowered whichever beasts found themselves in their way with a frontal assault, with the aura user among the two quite literally wrestling them to the ground before ending the fight with a single, lethal cut from a sword he manifested out of pure aura.

Seeing both this and the mage thinning the ranks of their troops with a mix of swordsmanship facilitated through physical enhancement spells and short bursts of offensive spells, the two beasts leading the horde sprang into action. Striding forward and stepping out of the crowd of beasts they were towering over, the two fifteen meter tall mythic ranks quickly sped up as they crossed the two hundred meters between themselves and the enemy formation.

Breaking out into a full sprint, partially stone-covered one of the two beasts unleashed a tremor into the earth to start the fight. Splitting open the ground before him as a jagged line headed toward the enemy aura user, he created a small group of sharp rock formations that shot up from beneath the man's feet.

Shattering against the target's armor, which he had manifested from his aura, the spikes momentarily trapped the man in place. Using that opportunity, the beast lowered its stone armor-covered head and pointed its two massive horns forward while speeding up even further.

Crashing into the results of its previous attack a moment later, the beast smashed through the rocky formation in a shower of debris. Breaking past the first two layers, it then slammed its head forward and into the aura user, striking his crossed arms with one of its horns just as he braced himself.

Despite this, the momentum behind the impact drove the tip of the weapon through the man's aura armor. Cutting through his right lower arm and barely missing the left one, it got diverted just past his torso and instead also tore through his shoulder as it reached past his body.

Before the pain of this could even set it, the flat outside of the horn struck. As its form was straight at its inner edge while the outer one curved inward to form the pointed tip, the beast's continued charge meant that this curve slammed the aura user back with the full momentum of the charge behind it.

And as unlike their strength, an aura user's weight only increases slightly, this was enough to send the man flying. Tumbling through the air after striking a part of the rock formation with his shoulder, he flailed his healthy left arm to try and stabilize his path as he came crashing down amid their formation.

In an instant, two beasts turned their attention toward him. Having followed after the two mythic ranks while watching out to not get in the way of their charge, they had joined the fight together with the rest of the beasts that had initially stayed back. Due to this, the balance of power had shifted rapidly in the second between the rock formation forming and the aura user being flung out, allowing the two to act without any humans pressuring them.

As such, they managed to freely gather mana and unleash an innate ability each before their target even had a chance to defend himself. And though he was still a mythic rank and as such resilient even when taken by surprise, the roar's shock-wave and the lightning that struck him still managed to send him flying further toward the back of the formation with smoke rising from the singed skin on his left side.

Losing track of him amid this, Darganth watched for a few more seconds as the reinforcing beasts either directly jumped into the fray or moved to surround the human formation and pick off fleeing enemies. What followed was a chaotic melee in which he couldn't make out much without putting more focus on it, leaving him to only occasionally get a glimpse at it as the two mythic rank beasts clashed with the two humans and the one beastman opposing them.

During this, the previously tight formation also scattered, leading to especially those beasts towards the edges of the fighting to increase their size. Before, this would've forced their formation to spread out further and left them vulnerable to being individually focused on and overwhelmed by numbers. But with the fighting devolving into individual duels due to the coordination between their enemies breaking down, this became less of a concern.

Suddenly, a towering aura avatar rose up amid this, its hand pressing against the base of the mythic rank beast's horns. Slowing down the latter's charge by digging its feet into the ground, the aura user managed to slow down the beasts with his avatar, allowing the blinding light that erupted from a nearby surge of mana to strike its side a moment later.

With a roar, the beast was thrown to the side as the explosions washed over the battlefield, incinerating humans, beastmen, and beasts near its epicenter alike. Even the aura user wasn't spared, with his aura avatar being blasted while the lightning that arced out from the epicenter latched onto his physical form.

Before he could catch himself from the aftershock of the strike, the beast he had been fighting staggered out of the smoke. Having just been hit by a ritual spell likely powered by multiple mages and charged over seconds or even minutes, the side of its torso had been completely burned away.

But even with its ribs showing and the hide around the impact wound still blistering while pieces of stone continued to break off the armored sections of its body, the beast still lumbered forward. Shaking the earth each time the massive, almost humanoid fists of its two frontal legs ended in slammed into the ground, it strode forward with shakily but determined steps.

Lowering its head toward the still disorientated aura user, it shot forward in a burst of speed. Reaching him with the second step, the beast didn't catch its momentum and let its head drop further, ramming one of its horns through the aura user's body before both disappeared into the ground as its head slammed into the earth with a booming rumble.

But before the dust cloud that followed even started to clear up, the human mythic rank mage that had previously stayed back raised her arm. With the limb still crackling with electricity from her acting as anchor-point to launch the ritual spell that another unit a few dozen kilometers away had conjured, she channeled its remaining energy and mixed it with her own mana to unleash a blinding bolt of lightning.

Shining through the dust as it vanished into the smoke, the spell broke apart into tens of individual strands of lightning as it collided with the beast. Arcing around its body, they latched onto the beast's muscles, paralyzing them in the process.

In an instant, the other remaining mythic rank joined the attack, his sword flashing but ultimately only glancing off the beast's thick hide.

Seeing this, Darganth was already about to take action himself when an ear-piercing dragon roar became audible in the clouds above. A moment later a fire dragon dived out of them, its wings barely extended as it plummeted toward the fight he had been watching at a steep angle.

With the announcement of its approach, the dragon had also almost instantly silenced the fighting. From the unhesitating reactions of all combatants and the speed with which the beasts retreated while the humans and beastmen turned their arrows and spells skyward similarly fast, Darganth assumed this wasn't the first time. Even the two mythic ranks almost instantly ceased their attacks on the trapped beast, with the two mages being the first ones to unleash a wave of spells skyward.

Ignoring the practical wall of attacks he was heading toward, the dragon weathered them with pure physical resilience as it waited a few more seconds before unleashing its breath. The moment he then came into range to strike the formation, he unfurled his wings and abruptly leveled out his trajectory while already letting searing flames erupt from his maw.

Tearing a line of devastation through the human formation, he contentiously shifted his head from left to right, incinerating everything in his path. Making no detour for the mythic rank beast that hadn't made it away in time, his flames even splashed against the rock dome it had conjured, partially meting through it though not breaking through in the short time before he already moved past.

Within seconds, this short flyover left the human and beastmen units in complete disarray. Wasting no time, the beasts charged back into the fray, diving into the flames still covering the ground without hesitation and breaking the last bit of resistance their enemies could muster.

Darganth meanwhile was following the dragon's flight path after sensing the almost imperceivable yet unmistakable feeling of dragon's authority. In response, the dragon had sharply turned to the left in accordance with the order Yldra had just given him, drawing Darganth's attention toward his destination.

Noticing the storm brewing there as Serania and a group of elves fought off a group of about a dozen human mythic ranks, he tightened his grip around the spear he had conjured up when he had been about to intervene in the other fight mere moments earlier. Waiting a brief second to get a full overview of the situation there, he spun his weapon and got into a fighting stance.

Using his dragon's authority to convey his intent to the dragon already approaching the fight on Yldra's orders, he coordinated their attacks before disappearing from his position. Preparing a spell, he waited a few seconds until the dragon started his attack before teleporting and joining the fight himself.